The Big Mo(mentum) is all going towards the Suns. Portland is doing what Portland does best.

When you get beat by an underachiever like Jason Richardson, it's pretty disheartening.

Dallas over Phoenix, and then it's going to be a Kobe-LeBron finals, folks. Now's the time to start working in the yard, gardening, tennis...

Meanwhile, Durant wins a big one in his playoff home debut, while Greg Oden talks on the radio about his mother doing his laundry. So very Sam Bowie.

Two games of watching them stand around on the defensive while the suns run around them and shooting bricks on the offensive end tells me it's over. Nate's fault or loss of Brandon's leadership? I'm not sure what it is other then pitiful.

I folded my watching of the game with five minutes left in the first half. It was just to painful to take any more. The Blazers could've won this series with Kevin Durant...Even a healthy Oden and/or Przybilla wouldn't have changed the outcome, though.

I do have to commend Paul Allen and crew for picking up Cameby and Howard. and this gives some hope for the future altho the NBA will always have a bias favoring the Lakers and some big city in the East.

Blazers overachieved this year, esp. under the circumstances as they unfolded through the season. They thrilled everyone the last week of the regular season and made a big splash in the opening playoff game. Be grateful. And you can't go far in a basketball tournament with your #1 player o-u-t. Roy needs the time to completely heal rather than have some delusional knuckleheads try to rush him back. "In all, 13 Blazers missed a combined 311 regular-season games, second only to the Warriors this season. Only Miller and forward Martell Webster played in all 82 games." -- Fox Sports (10 mins. ago).

"Even a Blazers dancer missed a month with a shoulder injury." -- Hard-Luck Trail Blazers Trying to See the Basket as Half Full
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/18/sports/basketball/18blazers.html

Who are they going to draft this time around?

I feel sorry for Paul Allen. He's got all these wonderful toys, but they always seem to break down at an inappropriate time.

It's hard to say that I'm looking forward to watching the next game. They've just been getting off to horrible starts in the first quarter and it never really gets much better from there. Maybe they'll surprise us and turn this thing around, but it would be the stuff of legends if they do.

I think I like Camby better than Przbilla or Oden - certainly bettern than Oden, actually. But I'd rather have Blake and Outlaw back now - the Blazers need guys who can score and those two were more reliable scorers. Blazers are toast...

Was at the game, so had to suffer in person. Several observations:

Rudy is lost - despite the fourth quarter shots. Martell looked lost in the first half - no moving - but then again, no one threw him the ball to shoot. Anytime the ball was low, Blazers seemed afraid to shoot, but given that they had a hard time getting any calls in the paint, made sense. And yes, Richardson hit some wide-open shots, but he also hit several with defenders so tight they could have determined boxers v. briefs.

Also, I was sitting next to a Salem-area fellow who is also a basketball official - clear that very few calls will be made against Stoudamire - traveling or fouls. Watch his feet - he likes to shuffle them like an eight year old boy on the carpet in the winter, trying to statically shock his sister.

As I write this, the total tally is Suns 107, Blazers 16 -- which closely resembles last night's halftime score.

it's going to be a Kobe-LeBron finals, folks.

How surprising. That's was sells tickets. Probably set up that way from the beginning.
Man, I hate the NBA.